[NTLUG:Discuss] Open Source

[Chris Cox]

Leroy Tennison wrote:
...
> You make an interesting point about forced conversion.  I'm wondering if 
> that may not be the avenue to more Linux adoption, here's what I mean: A 
> larger organization gets tired of paying for software, someone comes up 
> with a way to use Linux in the corporate environment instead.  It saves 
> money so management likes it.  Ask what the employees think?  Hardly, 
> just do it, so what if they kick and scream - it's the company's 
> strategic direction!  Do I expect this to happen with office automation 
> first?  No.  But what about the call center and other fairly highly 
> restricted environments?  I think it's more likely there.  If only we 
> had a good Linux LAN...

I don't have a hard statistic.  But of the "knee jerk" revolution
conversion crowd, those that got mad and made a mass conversion,
a significant portion returned to Windows.  And... the problem with
that is they won't be trying Linux again... at least not for a
VERY long time.

So... no sense putting a really bad taste in their mouth.  Better
to put Linux into places where it's well suited... and as mentioned,
there will be those who convert voluntarily.

> 
> Is this the right way to do it?  No, was corporate politics ever the 
> right way to do things?  I'll leave that for you to answer...

I was in a BoF at a Linux conference back in the mid-late nineties.
The BoF was about getting your corporation to use Linux.  About 90%
of the people there believe in a grass roots, skunk works style
approach.  But there was this small excitable guy who insisted
that the ONLY way (and he was adamant about it) to get corporations
to switch was for the company to enforce a switch to Linux from
the top down (thus you go after the VP's and P's and sway them
to mandate Linux throughout).

As some of you may have guessed, the "guy" was Eric Raymond.

My own personal experience is that the ground-up approach
works much, much better. Hopefully Eric won't shoot me for
saying so. :)

I do agree that there are certain niche's where Linux is
an excellent fit across the board.. including the desktop.
So... there isn't a "one size fits all" statement that anyone
can make.... thus I can only say "in general".  I do wish
I had some stats about the companies that tried to go
100% and then went back though.

But who knows... maybe ESR is right...  I just know
there's a lot of former Linux users that may never give
it another try (which is a shame when you think about how
far things have come just over the past few years).